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The Vietnamese Zen master, whom Martin Luther King nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize, is a voice of power and wisdom in this time of tumult in the world. We visited Thich Nhat Hanh at a retreat attended by police officers and other members of the criminal justice system; they offer stark gentle wisdom for finding buoyancy and “being peace” in a world of conflict, anger, and violence.

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is a Vietnamese Zen monk, poet, and peacemaker. He co-founded the An Quang Buddhist Institute, the Van Hanh Buddhist University in Vietnam, and Plum Village, a Buddhist training monastery in France. He is the author of many books, including Being Peace, The Miracle of Mindfulness: A Manual on Meditation, The Art of Communicating, Fragrant Palm Leaves: Journals 1962–1966, and The Long Road Turns to Joy — A Guide to Walking Meditation.
(photo by Paul Davis)

served in the criminal justice system for 25 years, including as an Assistant Attorney General in the Wisconsin Department of Justice, and as a police officer with the City of Madison Police Department. She is a licensed attorney, a clinical social worker, and co-founder of the Center for Mindfulness and Justice in Madison, Wisconsin. She was ordained as a dharma teacher by Thich Nhat Hanh in 2008.

is co-director of the Lotus Institute in Encinitas, California and an ordained Baptist minister. He also owned a management consultant firm for Fortune 500 companies. He co-authored a book with his wife, Love’s Garden: A Guide to Mindful Relationships.

Reflections

I was doing the dishes on the morning I heard the program, Saturday morning, WNYC 93.9 NYC. I listen to SOF program often. I just want to say that the story about the man who placed flowers on his grieving father's doorstep -- until eventually the widowed man emerged one day, really moved me to tearfulness. How the son reflected on perhaps if he had not been exposed to the teachings of THN, might have just said " forget you.." if confronted with his father's self-imposed isolation during grief.

This may seem ridiculous, but I had just rather harshly disciplined the younger of our two dogs for an infraction and thought, man had I heard not just the story of the one man, but the voice of Thay -- it was so clear, I might have not let myself be so blind and unthinking in my anger at the dogs actions.

It is not only that incident, but the simple word "mindfulness" and the descriptions of walking meditation being bolstered by an accompanying child; all in all it was a very powerful and informative program and I am now hungry to learn more about this man, who sadly, I have not heard about before!

Thank you very much, it was a real -- in my eyes and ears -- a radio triumph. Sunshine, M.

(rather harshly disciplined the younger of our two dogs for an infraction)
I am sorry to hear that you have in the past taken an attitude of violence and unkindness toward your dogs, but am glad to hear that you have started to think differently. Our beloved animals, our fellow sentient beings, are ours to care for and love, not treat with cruelty. They have emotional feelings and are intensely sensitive to suffering. I don’t know any other animals (dogs) who so desperately want to please, so perhaps people misjudge what is actually going on with them and assume they intentionally do wrong.
There are people who can help you to treat your animals with positive reinforcement rather than punishment. Compassion and kindness are why we are here in this world, to ease suffering rather than to add to it. Violence has no place in a loving household.
Sincerely,

Today , I road my bike a long way , longer than I ever have in the past.
While riding , i realized that i had entered a zen state . I was only riding my bike , I wasn't thinking about the kids ,wife , mother , work
just breathing , when I did wander into work , the world , the lakers
without thinking i went right back to breathing and pedaling .
My father passed earlier this year, I miss him . A notion entered my possibly oxygen deprived head , that I should take a detour and go see my mother. It ws good, it isn't always. Then I drove home listening to your show and it all made sense. I keep finding myself drawn to budhism
and Viet Nam.

I am sharing this site with my son's ,wife and friends .

Thanks I was really touched by this programming , I am grateful for beach traffic in los angeles.

The pleasant anecdotes on mutual understanding and peaceful resolution of conflicts ignore an important fact: over the centuries since the Battle of Marathon there have been a series of epic struggles which no pacifist could stop and without the efforts of comparatively few people the present world would be quite different. For over 2000 years the little flame of democracy has be threatened by often overwhelming forces and in Churchill's words "on agate edges turns the world." If a Union cavalry general had not recognized the importance of holding the high ground at Gettysburg, there would have been two countries...neither strong enough to win either world war last century. A marine officer during the Viet Nam War told me something that has a Zen ring: "Peace is a delicate flower growing out of the barrel of a gun...and when everything is calm...you don't see the gun." (photo: I'm on the left with Elias Zerhouni (recent Director NIH))

thich nhat hahn knows quite a bit about being in war - if you know his story, such as rebuilding a bombed villages for the fourth time, while "taking care of my anger" - he was in the midst of the killing and war - and being an officer in a war requires clarity and mindfulness even more to check against excesses.

while what is said above is undoubtedly true given the level of consciousness prevalent at that time, surely today we can look at these issues differently. we have 'progressed' greatly since the days of yesterday and primarily in the understanding we have embedded in our consciousness by such teachers as Thay, the Dalai Lama, and those non-buddhists like ML King, and Bishop Tutu. When we look at the idiocy that started the first WW and its ending with the establishment of the League, we failed the world mightedly when the League members did not march in right at the outset when the Germans under Hitler moved into that disputed territory in France, the Sudetenland and Austria. We know what companies from the 'west' were in business with HItler and we also know what efforts were being made to spin the facts to incite the population of Germany. Despite this we continue to allow the same nonsense to take place and we actually don't hold those responsible despite all that we are fully aware of today. Thay's message that there is no 'us and them', there is no 'good and bad' and other examples of dualistic thinking is timely and on a day like today, Remembrance DAy here in Canada, i urge all to reflect just a little deeper and not to endorse the level of consciousness that existed in the past and which fortifies countries like the USA in their obscene spending for weapons of destructions while fighting internally over the funding for a policy of reasonably priced health care for the unfortunate ones in their midst. so when reflecting on the conflicts of the past, look deeply and within 'the other' one can clearly see oneself and ask oneself when you this is seen whether your cell in the body of life is going to repeat the cancerous level of consciousness present all too completely in the past from days long before the Battle of Marathon. and please, please, it was the combined efforts of many around the world which defeated the forces amassed by Hitler and his minions, not just the forces of the USA.

There have certainly been many great battles. However, there have been many thousands of times more battles and wars that have faded into insignificance in our public memories. The greatness that persists is mostly a function of what comes after the battle, not the battle itself. Most great human achievements can only emerge when life is no longer defined by which side you are on. And among those achievements is the beginning of an understanding of how peace can be encouraged. World Wars 1 and 2 offer almost trivial examples. Punishment of the losers after WW1 led quickly to another war. Though often clumsy, efforts at mutual understanding after WW2 have so far kept the major players out of direct conflict. As the Buddha said: "Hatred has never been ended by hatred, hatred can only be ended by love".

Listening to Thich Nhat Hanh brought me back to the Buddist reading and practice I had been doing in the early 90s, before my children came into my life. I had dropped it, but kept the books on the shelf. I was reminded what it felt like to see the world through the eyes of compassion and how to deal with anger. I felt my own heart start to soften again. I know I will return to my practice again starting in the now. Thank you so much for this.

After listening to the audio conference with Nhat Hanh I realized that many leaders could learn a lot about how to avoid wars and maintain peace in their countries. Hanh believes that proper techniques of communication are important and using the proper techniques can avoid wrongful deceptions. I myself as many often desire the comfort of peace and non-suffering. Nhat teaches us that we as people need to understand the life of suffering and embrace it. Suffering teaches how to be happy and compassionate,

It's interesting that of the eight "Pertinent Posts" on this page about Thich Nhat Hanh, three are about Buddhists who were born Jewish but had weak (or non-existent) Jewish educations when they were young: Sharon Salzberg, Adam Yauch and Sylvia Boorstein.

On Sunday night I was returning home to Los Angeles from Thich Nhat Hanh's Mindfulness Retreat at the Magnolia Grove Monastery in Batesville, Mississippi, trying to maintain a mindful presence as I navigated through airports in Memphis and Houston. My flight was delayed so by the time I got to my car at LAX it was almost 9:00 p.m. As I drove home, I turned on NPR and the universe was speaking to me. Krista Tippett came on the air and talked about being the the presence of wise human beings. I, of course, was thinking about Thich Nhat Hanh and, as it turned out, she was too.

Thay and his teachings are gifts to the world and I encourage everyone to read his books, listen to his talks and attend a retreat. The theme of the Mississippi retreat was "Healing Ourselves is Healing the World." How can I describe the retreat? We laughed and we cried. We walked and we sang. We listened to Thay and we listened to our hearts. Our spirits were nourished. We came together as one.

When life can be lived by doing our best for others more blessings come. We don't always see blessings for what they are, yet they still effect us.I have the feeling that we aren't supposed to know of every blessing that effects us, it would be very complicated and consuming. Being thankful for all blessings is important.

I have rarely been so affected by a radio/podcast piece in my life. I have had the great pleasure of getting to know several monks of both Catholic and Buddhist backgrounds and have learned much from those encounters, however, listening to the philosophy of Thich Nhat Hanh moved me. I was uplifted by the message of Thich Nhat Hanh of using the dualities of life, embracing both the garbage and the flower as necessary parts of life and the human experience.

He teaches that suffering is the key to enlightenment, that without suffering, we are unable to harness compassion and understanding and that he believes that suffering must continue into the next life.

It is this, almost enthusiastic, embrace of suffering that was so fascinating to me. The philosophy that suffering is the key to enlightenment and the ability to understand and communicate with each other that rang so true to me. I have used the same explanation with those I have counseled about their own sufferings, but not nearly so elegantly and it is a beautiful way to look at the world in contrast to a religion like Christianity which views suffering as the result of sin and failure and as a punishment, and thus focuses on overcoming the suffering as a way to leave suffering behind rather than embracing suffering as something that exists to help us reach the ultimate enlightenment.

I understand there are significant cultural differences when trying to compare the foundations of a Western religion like Christianity with an Eastern religion like that of Thich Nhat Hanh. In my travels in the East, I have noticed a much greater sense of community over self, which I think contributes to the espousal of embracing suffering and how it contributes to compassion and enables more effective communication. However, I have seen how Christianity has brought together the workings of many different religions in their development and I think there would be a lot of benefit to applying the message of Thich Nhat Hanh with the words and works of Christianity.

I fully appreciate the view about the substantial cultural differences when trying to make an unbiased comparison between the foundations of Western vs Eastern religions. Both have their place in this wonderful world of ours and from my own Christian point of view, always admired the pure simplicitity of Eastern religions linked to Budhism, Taoism and other similar ones.

Thank you so much Krista & Trent for publishing this episode especially at the time when our beloved Thay is slowly recovering from his brain hemorrage which left him on a coma for a couple of months. We continue praying for him...I will reblog this episode tomorrow Sunday on The Spiritual Journalist!

I have felt a hole in my recent posts in prioritizing a need police and members of communities of color they police to get to know community members as full human beings—a need to show differences that individual police attitudes can make.

Today, I followed my usual Sunday practice of getting up an hour early, showering and taking my walk through the then dark and quiet streets of my neighborhood, and listening to “On Being” with host Krista Tippett on my local 7am hour broadcast. Today, the main interview was with Thich Nhat Hanh, with the second quarter segment an interview of Cheri Maples, describing how Thich Nhat Hanh’s Zen training had profoundly transformed her approach from taking charge (her example, a domestic violence call) to compassion for the suffering of an angry father, for his full humanity (http://onbeing.org/program/thich-nhat-hanh-mindfulness-suffering-and-engaged-buddhism/74). The broadcast is transcribed; read or listen, take your pick.

Maples has brought other police officers through the Zen training. More broadly, Michael DeValve, who teaches police officers among others at Fayetteville State University, a follower of Thich Nhat Hanh himself, has just published A Different Justice: Love and the Future of Criminal Justice Practice in America, describing how mindfulness has transformed is own criminal justice teaching and practice (as a mediator). Maples graphically describes how mindfulness transformed her policing. Aggressive police officers can be trained, indeed train themselves to become peacemakers, where compassion overcomes fear, anger and force. Thich Nhat Hanh’s presence and training has dramatically transformed the criminal justice practices of DeValve, of Maples, and probably of many of the police Maples has also drawn in.

This is not to say that all police officers (or all people for that matter) need Zen training and self-cultivation. It has worked for some who have tried, but to order people to become mindful is a contradiction in terms. For one thing, I’m confident that compassionate, empathic policing in communities of color continues to exist now as it did when I rode along. Like peacemaking generally, it goes largely unrecorded and unnoticed, unrecognized and unrewarded in popular culture, let alone in police administration and evaluation. There have already been many paths to compassionate policing besides that taken by Maples—a police presence to cultivate and celebrate. Compassion lies in all of us, police included, to be awakened as it was for Maples in volatile settings—as here where police are authorized by law to kill unarmed people in groups supposed in criminology textbooks as in popular and political culture to be especially dangerous. As DeValve and I have found in mediation, adversaries can overcome their fear of and anger at one another in moments of safety, as they recognize one another’s fuller humanity. And so I am led to believe that a root remedy for police violence in communities of color especially is to arrange non-law enforcement settings for police to participate in the lives of the people they police, on a regular basis, to know them in respects other than as suspects, as law-breakers and as complainants. Among all warring groups, police and communities of color included, that ultimately is how wars abate, including the killing. Meanwhile, my thanks to Cheri Maples for illustrating how compassionate policing defuses violence for those moved to try it.

Hello. Thank you dear Krista Tippett, for bringing out this topic and for the story of the police woman and police experience in general.
Nowdays, here, in middle of Europe,would be very easy to get caught on the opinion, that the evial comes from the outside world, from "those" people, with that different religion, who don´t respect anybody else´s way of living...And for a while I was thinking the same way!But you get nowhere, while taking this pass...It only brings more negativity...And it increases.
But when I picture hugging one of "those bad guys",(and it´s not easy to do, even in imagine...)it always brings me to tears ...
So,I am sure, each of them is part of me and they represent my own hate, anger and negativity.
To spread fear makes no good. I´ll rather keep sharing Ho´oponopono...
Think it probably does the same work,either you are working on it with the outside world, or just with your self, your mind, your heart. Maybe both would be the perfect combination .)
One day, we will all be holding hands...
Thank you again...
Štěpánka

I found today's program very enriching as it validates my vision of what I am doing with my career and my life. I teach in a high security youth prison and and the pervasive nature of suffering within the walls works against learning and growth.

But I do not let that stop me. As Thich Nhat Hahn stated, communication is vital in decreasing conflict. After years of contemplation and meditation, I have arrived at the position that compassion is my core value. I use compassion of the human condition to initiate conversation with my student (inmates) and help them rediscover their own humanity.

To paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., I will not compromise the quality of my character to treat others as they have treated me. It is my hope that my students (many whom feel they have been rejected by all of society) may find in me a person that believes that their is more to them than what they currently see.

So, many thanks for a wonderful program. Sometimes we need to hear someone else put our actions in to words so we can better conceptualize what we are doing and maintain healthy mindfulness.

Thank you reaching for this deeper conversation. Stephen King in his novel Duma Key about an artist after an life altering accident uses the phrase "the truth is in the details"; the generous offering by On Being of the unedited conversations, poems, the associated podcasts, the wonderful blogs, the books, the songs, create immersions that that help open our eyes to the fullness of our situations as we too reach for "right" being.

I discovered THN through a old friend of mine who is an ordained Priest in the THN tradition.I read two of his books about mindfullness and Jesus.I learned walking meditation and found a group of Christians who meditate and pray.It has changed my life.

After practicing Mindfulness For 15 years to deal with PTSD and Addiction it had become second nature. in The confusion and suffering during a Major stroke I remembered some teachings on as you die, you reincarnate The loss of ego and attachment being a Key. In intense pain and confusion as reality and cognitive function evaporated I started the breath, This practice has held up for me through, The loss of mobility, communication, cognitive function,and most of the things that make you, what you think you are. It has been the key to getting most things back. the experience on a whole has been an extremely positive in reinforcing my practice of mindfulness Plus the chance to relearn and reprogram my brain and learn how to understand my emotions based on these teachings rather than common thinking from Cutbank Montana in 1956
This And the forced mindfulness needed for every action after a brain injury
has been very helpful My use of mindfulness. during this change in my life. Has had an effect on the whole process of the stroke.
http://www.columbian.com/news/2014/aug/04/recovery-stroke-positive-attitude-kalama-man/

I had the privilege of being at that Green Lake retreat along with Cheri Maples and Larry Ward. As a criminal prosecutor I carry with me the story of a young police officer who described how he literally and figuratively armored himself in preparation for his shift. It continues to a powerful and useful image for me. While the separation--the armoring-involves alienation between us humans, awareness can turn the gap into a place for healing. It is the awareness of the ways I shield myself from the pain and anger inherent in my work that helps me day in and day out. When I see the people I prosecute and the people who have been hurt by crimes as part of the same 'ocean' that I swim in, I can begin to use compassion to help us all heal.

Inspired by Thich Nhat Hanh and the deep tradition of socially engaged buddhism, east and west, we have launched the Engaged Mindfulness Institute to train mindfulness facilitators and teachers who are inspired to bring the healing and transformative power of mindfulness to those most in need, most challenged and most deeply suffering among out fellow human beings -- at risk, challenged, homeless, incarcerated and institutionalized youth and adults, all those who are falling through the cracks of our society and communities, their basic human needs ignored, their pain and suffering unattended to, their beauty unseen, their souls unloved. www.engagedmindfulness.org